It is a great convenience to control my mount wirelessly via SkyVoyager on my iPhone. Especially very useful for Astrophotography.... centering the targets, framing etc becomes very easy with SkyVoyager.

StarMap and StarMapHD are some of my favorites. The iPhone version was great to learn the sky but the iPad version has revolutionized my observing. The ability to create exact eyepiece views for your given set of optics in a package has allowed me to do far more finding in my mag 4 urban skies. With maps and other planetarium programs, it was always so difficult to star hop with the finder that I usually gave up in frustration. With StarMap, you are able to easily track your progress across the heavens so multiple hops are easy to execute.

Before StarMap, I really only had fun under urban skies with the deep sky if I used GOTO. StarMap made hopping so much fun that I elected to complete the last 30 objects of my Binocular Messier Observing Club from my backyard rather than go to a dark site. I am planning on using it to complete my Messier Club from home also. Truly revolutionary for me.

Decent write up Tom! I had not heard of Galaxy Zoo so I am getting that for my iPhone. I had seen exoplanet, but it looks like it has been updated since I looked at it.

Some other great apps:NASA-- It is the NASA appMoon Phase-- I got this before Moon Globe came out, not bad but Moon Globe is better.Moon Atlas--Another Moon atlas!Distant Suns-- It was the highest rated program when I downloaded it, but there are always new planetarium programs coming out.

Something I discovered recently is iTunesU. It is lectures and class materials from Universities. I have been checking out University of Arizona so far, and there are about 10 lectures I have downloaded.

Do you know of any which can help you plan for Jupiter satellite and shadow events?

Mike,

Astromist provides some nice details on the Jovian moons, including shadow events. If this is important to you, it's the one I have that I would recommend. StarMap Pro and SkyVoyager/SkyGazer are nice and can show the view of Jupiter with the satellites, but I don't think they provide shadow events or the detail in terms of time and event. More info below.

Chris

In Astromist, if I click on Jupiter I can select Satellites, Red Spot or Events. From the help info for each:

Satellites: "Displays the relative positions of the Galilean satellites as seen from Earth. Jupiter is represented by the blue, vertical stripe. Move your finger along it to animate the image."

Red Spot: "Displays red spot (GRS) transit time (local time), Time in red means that GRS is visible. If not and icon indicates the reason (sun, jupiter not visible). Adjust lets you compute GRS longitude."

Events: "Calculates the Gallilean satellites' eclipses by and transits across Jupiter's disk for the given day. Slide your finger slogn the screen to change the date. Taps on the date to select a particular one." Here's an example for 11/02/2010 (CST)

Great article and great to see so many people interested in these applications.

My favorites on my IPOD Touch in order are...

Astromist (loved this on the Palm but so much better on IPOD Touch)StarMap PRO - great applicationSkyVoyager - good but I prefer it third to the others for various reasonsSkyGazor - this is the scaled down version of SkyVoyager - too simple for me, and anyone who needs more features and objectsStarWalk - cool but pretty basicDistant Suns - cool but pretty basicPlanets - really easy but only about planets

Great article and some great follow-up recommendations. I just discovered an app called "Astro Planner". It seems particularly geared towards planning an observing session. Simple and easy to use with all the necessary info. This is exactly what I am looking for in an app.

Does anyone know if the Astromist program offers observation session planning? The app looks very powerful but perhaps not easy to use. The developers website has info on the Palm version but nothing for the iPad. Regardless, Astromist looks tempting.

Emerald Chronometer - has about a dozen various watch faces, but most of them have astronomical uses. Graphical displays of sunrise and sunset, equation of time, lunar phases, graphical display of when the each planet is visible, world time clock, graphical display of moon and sun in comparison to South, orrery, etc.flyBy - When satellites will be visibleSpace Images - pretty self-explanatoryStars -

The app Living Earth HD makes a great companion for Moon Globe. You get a detailed Earth view with the current cloud patterns from weather sats, updates q3 hours. You can pause, spin, zoom. Save favorite cities for temp and weather.

I wish you could animate the clouds a few frames. Nevertheless, brilliant!

Star Walk is a good app. I believe it cost 1.99 in the app store. Point your phone anywhere in the sky and it shows you what star you're looking at. Plus it has the rise/set times for all the planets. Also you can select any dso,and it will guide you with arrows to the where the dso resides.And it has live satellite tracking. So, as far as I'm concerned its worth the money.

I wrote this app I'm glad someone brought it up here and really happy you like it!

Moshen

The app Living Earth HD makes a great companion for Moon Globe. You get a detailed Earth view with the current cloud patterns from weather sats, updates q3 hours. You can pause, spin, zoom. Save favorite cities for temp and weather.

I wish you could animate the clouds a few frames. Nevertheless, brilliant!